Common Premise Self-Storage and Retail Facilities Fabrication and Methodology

1 . A common premise facility system, comprising:

an area of land consisting of ten acres or less;

a retail facility on the area of land;

a rentable storage facility comprising a plurality of shipping containers on the area of land and external from the retail facility; and

wherein each shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers comprises a plurality of doors for accessing respective rentable storage units within a shipping container.

2 . The common premise facility of claim 1 and further comprising joining apparatus for coupling each shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers to at least one other shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers.

3 . The common premise facility of claim 1 and further comprising:

an electromechanical lock associated with each door in the plurality of doors; and

a controller for permitting remote control of the electromechanical lock for selectively unlocking a door associated with the electromechanical lock.

4 . The common premise facility of claim 3 :

wherein the controller comprises a communications interface for communicating with a network; and

wherein the controller is responsive to a communication from the network for selectively unlocking a door associated with an electromechanical lock.

5 . The common premise facility of claim 1 and further comprising a parking area for use by consumers of the retail facility, and wherein the plurality of shipping containers is located within the parking area.

6 . The common premise facility of claim 1 wherein each shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers comprises a floor; and

further comprising apparatus for offsetting a bottom of each door in the plurality of containers such that when each door is closed, a lower edge of the door descends below an upper surface of the floor of the container.

7 . A method of operating a computing system to control access in connection with a rentable storage facility unit, comprising the steps of:

enrolling a rentable unit user via an electronic interface to the computing system;

providing a user interface to the user via the computing system;

receiving, at the computing system, from the user, in response to the user interacting with the user interface, a request to unlock a door for accessing an interior of a rentable storage facility unit; and

responsive to the request, and via the computing system, operating a door lock associated with a selected door coupled to a shipping container, the shipping container partitioned into multiple interior storage units and having multiple doors, for unlocking the selected door for providing the user access to a selected interior storage unit of the multiple interior storage units.

8 . A method of installing a rentable storage facility proximate a retail facility, and within a perimeter that encloses the retail facility and the rentable storage facility in an area of land consisting of ten acres or less, the method comprising:

at a location outside the perimeter, coupling a plurality of doors to each shipping container in a plurality of shipping containers, each door in the plurality of doors for accessing rentable storage unit within the shipping container;

positioning the plurality of shipping containers within the perimeter; and

within the perimeter, coupling each shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers to at least one other shipping container in the plurality of shipping containers.

9 . The method of claim 8 wherein the positioning and coupling steps collectively occur in a time period less than 48 hours.

10 . The method of claim 8 wherein each shipping container comprises two endwalls and two sidewalls, and further comprising, at a location outside the perimeter, coupling a facade to at least one endwall and at least one sidewall.

11 . The method of claim 8 wherein each shipping container comprises two endwalls and two sidewalls, and further comprising, at a location outside the perimeter, coupling a facade to at least one endwall and at least one sidewall and leaving at least one sidewall unfinished.

12 . The method of claim 8 and further comprising, within the perimeter, coupling a roof structure to the plurality of shipping containers.

13 . (canceled)

14 . (canceled)

15 . (canceled)

16 . (canceled)

17 . (canceled)

18 . The common premise facility of claim 1 wherein each of the respective rentable storage units within a shipping container is separate by a wall from any other rentable storage unit within the shipping container.

19 . The common premise facility of claim 1 wherein the area of land consists of ten acres or less.